


A Coffin-- is a small Domain

by middlemarch



Category: Poldark (TV 2015), Poldark - All Media Types
Genre: Class Issues, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Marriage, Motherhood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-01
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-18 23:48:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8180456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/middlemarch/pseuds/middlemarch
Summary: Demelza's grief is lonely.





	

Demelza knew that Ross could never understand her grief and she didn’t fault him for it. Oh, he raged and wept and she let him, he sulked and he woke from nightmares calling her name, “Oh my Julia, Julia, don’t go!” as if ever a body decided to stay without God’s willing it. She’d been obscurely pleased she’d been right, that he loved their daughter so deeply, even if her mother hadn’t been what she should be, even if Demelza hadn’t given him an heir first and foremost—Julia had been the apple of his eye and his mourning showed it. Hers could not. Elizabeth would have understood this, if they’d met to talk, Verity, Aunt Agatha, any of the women of the village would have known something of what was in Demelza’s heart and she wouldn’t have needed to say it aloud. It would have been restful but she’d make no demands on Ross now, not even to have a woman about the place for succor, as the Book called it, as her father called from the by-ways, drawing out the vowel like a rook’s cry. She wished Julia’s bed were a little bigger, so she could lie upon it, and she swallowed back the scream she wanted to make fill every room of Nampara, the salt-scoured sky and the disinterested sea as well, that she had only a blossom to put where her babe ought to be. Demelza let herself be comforted that her daughter had had what she’d never herself, a kindly father and lively mother who loved her for her every new grace and every small flaw, a full belly since she drew breath and the softest cloth for her bonnet, her dress, the swaddling for her messes, everything fresh and dainty and dear as her darling had been. Julia’d been buried like a little duchess and Demelza nursed her memories of Julia’s life as she’d nursed her babe, at her breast through the long light of the Cornish evening, the long unraveled dark that followed, transfiguring herself into nourishment for every last recollection. She’d never let her babe go, whatever Ross said, whichever child would come and fill her belly and her strong arms; there’d always be a bright little fairy about Nampara’s last corner with Ross’s dark, mischievous eyes and fine, unruly curls hinting at auburn, a bold, piping voice she’d hearken to first and they’d say that was the way of it with Mistress Demelza Poldark, always and ever and be about your business.

**Author's Note:**

> My first foray into Poldark, but who can resist? Demelza is such a wonderful character and Ross is such an impetuous, dark, conflicted hero and I'm sure they'll let each other down more and make up and we'll have another view of the sea to put it all in perspective. Here's my take on Demelza's grief and how is isolates her from Ross, what she can't explain to him as a woman and from a much lower social class.
> 
> The title is from Emily Dickinson.


End file.
